VW says newer motor may also have had trick software

BERLIN -- German automaker Volkswagen said Thursday the U.S. cars identified as having been fitted with software to cheat on emissions tests include some vehicles with a newer diesel engine.

The company said after the emissions-rigging scandal became public last month, the software was installed on cars with variants of the EA 189 diesel engine built to the "Euro 5" emissions standard.

The company now is looking at cars with the EA 288 diesel engine and that same emissions standard, Volkswagen spokesman Pietro Zollino said. Vehicles with that engine built to the newer "Euro 6" standard are not affected, he added.

He said 70,000 cars in the U.S. with the early version of the EA 288 engine -- including certain Golf models, the Beetle, Jetta, Passat and Audi A3, all from 2015 -- are among the 482,000 vehicles that have been identified in the U.S. as containing the suspect software.

VW said later no vehicles sold in Europe with the EA288 motor, either the "Euro 5" or the "Euro 6" versions, had illegal software.

Overall, the company still estimates some 11 million vehicles worldwide could be affected by the scandal.